I regard it as an irony that the self-described greatest civilization in human history has been brought to its knees by an uncommon cold.

I have my ideas about how this is being handled and I will not be posting them online, not in a time when the iron heeled jackboots of the state are being refitted for the information age.

I will say this: small businesses will get crushed and big businesses will boom. The fiction of freedom will suffer a severe rewrite—yes, another plane. Ever since the announcement of the most virulent pandemic in human history, planes have been roaring forth into the Portland sky every half hour...

Now hail is hitting the roof, the trains sound in the distance and some asshole is drag-racing a mile away, the hipster faggots at the Air B&B next door have stopped screaming…

Numerous local businesses have already failed here and many signs to customers have gone up on windows, one of them christening the pandemic as “The Thing.”

I have written 24 chapters in the book about my March experience, which will be published in mid to late April. Based on the civic tone in this nation, and the fact that I have already been censored four times by as yet unknown parties, I will no longer post opinion pieces concerning current affairs nor speak of them on podcasts. I have some history books and novels to finish and don’t need be dragged away under whatever amped up Patriot Act laws will permit perpetual jailing of crackpots without charges or counsel.

If you have a question or idea you want me to address about such things it will be answered in a book.

As far as my book back log, the 32 and more complete, some for years, and not yet published, as my literary Angel Lynn wants my work to be properly edited—once I have announced that a book is complete, you can send me a donation and request for the PDF and get the typo-riddle[d] version that I have sent to Dear Miss Lockhart.

People out here in Portland are calling this pandemic “The Thing,” in increasing numbers. I have no idea if this terminology will catch on. I have my own name for it, based on the way apocalypse was pronounced by the game store clerk who rang out my purchase of some role playing miniatures for my ten- and eleven-year-old roommates.

I’m calling it the Apocalisp.

That book is seven days from completion and stands at 25,000 words and should finish around 30,000 and enable Lynn to bring it in at just under 200 pages. Even if I catch “The Thing” I should be able to finish it before I’m uploaded into eternity.